


just some twisted dream

by checkmate



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, M/M, Song fic, i'm not sure why i did this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-29
Updated: 2014-08-29
Packaged: 2018-02-15 07:22:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 901
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2220501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/checkmate/pseuds/checkmate
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s been three weeks and Tony’s barely moved a muscle. </p>
<p>or, 5SOS's Amnesia in a fic. I'm sorry.</p>
            </blockquote>





	just some twisted dream

**Author's Note:**

> I wanted to write something quick and one sided with no plot or anything going on in particular to practise my narrative voice and this is what happened. It is quite likely to happen again, because it's easy to write one sided stuff when some band has already written a plot for you.

As the rest of the tower is bustling with life, he just exists.

It’s been three weeks and Tony’s barely moved a muscle. He stares straight forward, focus going through the television screen, through the wall behind it, until he is just staring into a blank void. “You’ve got to get out of here, Tony.” Pepper says gently, laying a hand on his shoulder and placing a cheese sandwich  on the bed beside him. “You can’t just sit here for the rest of your life.”

Tony doesn’t even hear her come in, but he accepts the sandwich in silence. He doesn’t want to leave the room; it’s safe there. There’s nothing left in this one tiny space that can hurt him. The rest of the world,  he’s not so sure about. “How is he?” He asks as Pepper is about to give up. She hovers in the doorway, not turning to look back at him.

“He’s fine, Tony. He’s good.” She says, and it’s 100% convincing. He can tell when Pepper is lying, and she’s not. Bruce is fine. He’s good. The news is like a knife straight through his heart, and Tony wishes he hadn’t asked. At least before, he could pretend that he wasn’t the only one who felt so numb. But Bruce is fine. Good for Bruce.

“I’m going out.” He says firmly, and Pepper manages to hide her astonishment with relative success. “I don’t know where I am going or how long I will be, so don’t wait up for me.” He still doesn’t really want to leave the room, but the thought that Pepper could have answered the same question about him frightens him.

“How’s Tony?” Bruce would ask, and Pepper would give her speciality serene smile, and tell him that he’s practically catatonic, that he might as well be dead for all the good he’s doing the world, and yet Bruce still hasn’t even phoned. No. Tony would rather pretend that he is fine than spend any more time being so pathetic.

He gets in a car, picked at random, and _drives._ He’s not focussing on where he’s going, he’s barely focussing on anything at all. His eyes are starting to do the void thing again, and he shakes his head, desperately trying to snap himself out of it. It’s only when he stops to recollect his thoughts that he realises where he is.

It’s a park. It’s a kind of shitty park, one built for the ‘youth’ and soon neglected for being categorically uncool, and it is where Bruce and Tony last kissed. It’s almost like he can still smell the smoke in the air from that final shared joint, like he can still taste Bruce’s lips mingled with that distinctive sweetness. He isn’t big on drugs, but Bruce is, and it is, it was, a thing they did together. Bruce brought the drugs, Tony brought the booze, and they would hang out and get wasted like a couple of dumb high school kids. There was no judgement between him and Bruce, just mutual understanding and shared addictions.

The memory is so vivid it feels real, and Tony adds it to his secret hoard of little things he is willing his brain to let go off. It’s amazing, he thinks, how Bruce has managed to worm his way into every aspect of Tony’s life in such a short time. He falls asleep every night in an empty bed, like he has for years, but suddenly it feels wrong because for a few short months, he had got used to dozing off with a weary Bruce beside him, his arm slung low across his hips.

“Is he really fine?” Tony asks Pepper when he returns. She doesn’t even look up from her newspaper, just flicking to the next page.

“As far as I know.”

Tony sinks into the chair opposite her. It feels weirdly like a visit to his psychiatrist. “How?” He chokes out. The air is too thick to breathe, but only he seems to be having trouble with it. Pepper puts down her newspaper and really looks at him for the first time in weeks. “What we had was real, right? It was dumb, but it was real.” It’s a statement, because Tony was there. He remembers every minute of it, and something about Bruce just lifts him out of the dirge of normal life and gives him meaning. It had to be real; there’s no way someone could fake completely changing someone’s life like that.

“If you say so.” Pepper says, diverting her gaze once more. She’s stalling. She knows something. Tony can tell, but he blusters on.

“But if it is, was, real, how can he be fine?” He asks. He’s desperate for somebody to give him an answer, because his own mind can’t compute it. How could Bruce be fine when he’s such a wreck?

He remembers the tears the day Bruce left, but he can’t remember whether it was him or Bruce doing the crying. Possibly both. Bruce wouldn’t even tell him where he was going, or why he was going, just that he was.

And then Pepper drops the bomb on him. “He’s seeing someone else.” She says. Tony implodes. It’s like the last string that is holding him together has snapped, and he’s left floating. His last hope that Bruce is coming back has vanished. He’s gone.  

 

**Author's Note:**

> As usual, my [tumblah](http://isaac-laehey.tumblr.com) is here.


End file.
